U.S. top 20 prescribed drugs based on sales 2018

Humira was the top medicine in the United States based on sales in 2018, generating 18.3 billion U.S. dollars in revenue. The branded drug – used to treat arthritis – has topped revenue rankings for a number of years and made around ten billion U.S. dollars more than the next ranked medicine in 2018.

AbbVie in healthy position thanks to sales of top products

Spending on Humira in the United States more than doubled between 2014 and 2018. The biopharmaceutical company responsible for the production of the drug, AbbVie, generated net revenues of around 33 billion U.S. dollars in 2019. Humira, Imbruvica, and Mavyret were AbbVie’s top three products based on sales in 2018, combining for an 82 percent share of the company’s total revenue – Humira’s worldwide revenue alone accounted for approximately 61 percent.

How much money is spent on medicines in the United States?

In the United States, total spending on medicines reached a record 482 billion U.S. dollars in 2018, with sales of branded drugs accounting for around 80 percent of the market. Drugs can be categorized in several ways, but a common method is to group them by what they are used to treat. Around 60 billion U.S. dollars was spent on antidiabetic agents in the United States in 2018, making it the top therapeutic category based on sales.